my love
by paper piper
Summary: rin waits for no man, but she waits for her lord. -rin/sessh


Inspired by Sara Bareilles' "My Love;" this is a meditation on Rin's teen years without Sesshomaru, dreaming of his return.

OF COURSE, I OWN NOTHING!

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><p>"My Love"<p>

Rin stood in the open field. The village was a small dot in the hills, but she could still see movement as the people hustled and bustled throughout their day. It was a warm spring morning; she had spent it helping Kagome collect herbs before straying off by herself. She was sixteen years old, and alone.

This field was a sacred place to her; it was their place in the same way that the well was special to Inuyasha and Kagome. There was something magical, something romantic, about it, although it was unlikely.

He had left her here, six years ago, in this field.

_He bends his breath around my name_

_And I am humbled_

_I feel small and plain_

Although jaded women would tell her that she shouldn't, Rin trusted him. She didn't give it a second thought. It was as natural as breathing.

She relived the moment in her mind.

"Rin," her lord said. His voice was always soft and deep, rumbling, sleepy, seductive, the song that lured to her to bed and rocked her to sleep. It echoed in her dreams, and it called her awake.

"My lord?" was her customary answer. Rin always called him her lord; as a child, she always thought of him as such, as the guardian of her person, and inevitably, the keeper of her heart. Simple. Easy.

"I am going away for a while, Rin," he told her, and it took her years to understand the tremor in his voice—an alien sound. "I am leaving you in the keeping of the village until I return."

Rin was immediately afraid, but he steadied her with his arms and her name.

"Rin." The word was a spell, and she could not resist it.

He was gone.

_But his arms are angels by his side_

_You need not ask if they're open, just how wide_

There was that unmovable place in her heart that remembered waking to his arms after she thought she had died—and knowing that beautiful creature had saved her.

He—he and no other—had picked up the shabby child from the ground, a child who had no use for him—she was dead! Humans had never done anything for her; they spat and cursed and called her a demon's whore. She saw the looks young men and old men alike gave her. She could not walk down the dirt path of the village without a glare or a whisper, even after all this time.

It was a comfort to her to smile when they weren't looking and think, "If only they knew. I would rather be his whore than their wives."

_His lips are day_

_And his skin is night_

_Oooh, and with our love we conjure up the twilight_

Rin grew into herself. As a child, she had not been particularly self-conscious, but there was an element of fear in her that was only quieted because he was near. Without his shadow over hers, she felt herself alone for the first time.

Kagome became the balm for her early teen years: through her awkward gangly stage, the subsequent plummeting confidence, and the beginnings of womanly beauty. Kagome was the smile and gentle nudge, the elder sister that Rin did not know she needed. And although neither girl knew it, Kaede watched them both and felt her childhood with Kikyo being relived.

_His fingers are music to my soul_

_And I feel his song play everywhere I go_

It grew harder and harder for Rin to see Inuyasha and Kagome together, or Sango and Miroku, and wonder when her own love would return. She carried his image in her mind always, she felt him always on the horizon, she leaped from bed in the mornings to check the forest.

_My love, my love is on his way_

_I can't wait to see the day_

_I thankfully lay me down_

There was never a doubt in her mind that he would come. Devotion like Rin's is the stuff of legend: princesses waiting for their princes to come—what is more romantic, more loving, that that? And Rin was loving, loving beyond the understanding of the rest of the village (no matter how Kagome tried to see).

_Oh, my love, my love is on his way_

_I'm waiting patiently_

_But if you see me now_

_My love, please hurry_

Patience is easy for the old, but never for the young, and Rin was very young. Despite her trust, despite her absolute and unfathomable faith, Rin was impatient. She felt herself grow older and wondered (irrationally) if she would still be beautiful when he came for her. She wanted always to be beautiful for him; it was a pure and selfless wish. He did not deserve anything undignified or ugly. He was lovely, and only loveliness should touch him.

_He loves with rhythm_

_And paints with flame_

_He comes in pieces with no name_

Her heart broke a little every year. So crushed was she by love, that simple, sweet girl.

At first, Rin even tried to compose poetry for him, though she felt silly; she hummed tunes and named them for him; she was a little girl in many ways still, and she loved with the love of a little girl.

With her maturity, she turned to the sexual side of love. She wondered what it would feel like, to tremble in his arms and let him kiss her anywhere, everywhere. She saw the other boys in the village and wondered, but they could never compare, never, not to her lord.

_I won't need answers, I'll just know_

_Cause I've read the sonnets about his soul_

Then—then it happened, soon, too soon, not soon enough.

Rin was on all fours in the mud that evening, like a little girl, covered head to toe in filth. Day was sliding from the sky, and she was digging colorful pebbles from the creek in the forest. Her hair was braided back from her face, and an eager grin stretched across her face.

She never pictured that he would come when she looked so common, and she flushed and stammered like a fool when he came near.

_He can be ordinary in the best ways_

_And still dance like a poet_

_Through every word he says_

He looked like an angel—his hair flowing behind him, his white kimono dragging the ground like wings dipped in darkness. Yet it was his eyes that arrested her; his eyes and the words out of his mouth, the most beautiful words she'd ever heard.

"To bed, wife."

_My love, my love is on his way_

_I can't wait to see the day I thankfully_

_Lay me down_

She melted; how could she resist? Those long pale fingers stripped her and pushed her to the ground and revealed his own stunning body, carved and coiled, riveting with demonic and sexual power.

He fell on her like a storm, dragged the hair tie from her dark locks and buried his nose in it. His eagerness was astounding, his energy unpredictable. He hungered for her body as she had never imagined he would. Rin felt beautiful, beautiful like some piece of art, as he clutched to her.

Embarrassed? Of course she was, but he did not care. He wrecked her modesty with ease, wrecked her thoroughly and lavishly. He shuddered in pleasure, and she followed with sighs.

"My love, my love," she called him, the only man she would ever use the title.

_My love, my love is on his way_

_I'm waiting patiently_

_But if you see me now_

_My love, please hurry_

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><p>Hope you enjoyed it! I was thinking about it this morning listening to this song, and it came to me to do a piece in Rin's POV. R&amp;R, son! :D<p> 


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